Who has the final word on the District: Congress or the D.C. Council?

The March 25 editorial “Politics over principles” missed the mark by focusing on federalism rather than liberty. The Reproductive Health Non-Discrimination Act and the Human Rights Amendment Act are direct assaults on the Catholic Church’s freedom of religion — the very first right set forth in the Bill of Rights. They mandate that local Catholics live in a manner they find morally objectionable, subjugating church teaching to the whims of the D.C. Council.

In the face of such infringement, the editorial demanded that everyone stand down, leaving this matter only to the courts. But the preservation of liberty and freedom is the responsibility of all of us, whether we are ordinary citizens, newspaper editors or members of Congress. Wherever these senators see tyranny, be it local or federal, it is their duty to stop it.

And I remind D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D) that many of the citizens who live in the District are Catholics who possess the same God-given rights enshrined in the First Amendment that everyone else in the country possesses. She seems unfazed that the local government treats them as second-class citizens unworthy of such rights.